Moriarty the Patriot

Anyone who is familiar with mystery and detective stories probably heard of the name ‘Sherlock Holmes’. However, how many are familiar with his future nemesis, William James Moriarty. An anti-hero. A mischievous mastermind. A cunning strategist. A living psychological weapon. Those are just a few ways to describe such a person. Welcome to a world where crime, corruption, and class system dominates the society. Watching Yuukoku no Moriarty feels like an old school mystery thriller with the good and bad folks. In their society, what separates from those that are drunk with power and those who seek to make the world a better place? It’s atough question as this show tests the integrity of a complex society in this 19th century. But make no mistake, when I first started watching this show, I already had a checklist of anticipated items on my mind. Among those includes the mystery and suspense as well as the character study of the main cast, particular Moriarty. His character profile is complex but one that we must understand him to get the best experience from this show. A show like this sets his character up as not a heroic protagonist but as an anti-hero. Throughout the story, we see his cunning mind at work when engineering scenarios to disrupt Great Britain’s class system. Taking place in this 19th century timeline, their land is dominated by nobles. Moriarty’s main purpose in life is to destroy such a system and seek to replace it with one that is justice. It all sounds complex and believe me, this show is not one that’s easily recommendable. To understand Moriarty, you have to dissect his actions and understand his origins. Luckily, early episodes provides details about his family origins and his relationship with Albert and Louis. It’s an important trademark as the three individuals are intertwined in the story. From episode 2, we learn the grim details and identity of William. Watch it for yourself and realize that William’s role in the story is more than just rebuilding society. It’s about showing the world can change even if means resorting to the darker experimentations and underworld activities to accomplish it. And that’s the type of person William is. He would take any risk and involve any individual to accomplish his goal to make an equal society. He walks the path of not righteousness but one that is ruthless with consequences every step along the way. That is William James Moriarty. Despite some of the controversial elements of the show, it’s actually not a complex story once you take a dive into its themes. Storytelling is sold with each arc consisting of cases and the machinations of the main characters’ actions. At the same time, we are exposed to the timeline of this era and realize how corrupt its class system really is. Nobility is a far cry from the meaning of justice and those who seek it will understand the immense difficult of challenging the system. However, we are talking about William James Moriarty here, the most infamous nemesis of the great Sherlock Holmes himself. But is this a character driven story or one filled with a desire to show us the world of the 19th century and its corruption in England? Watching every episode told me it’s a crime thriller and showing the darker side of humanity. A show like this is geared towards those who wants to learn more its story than just what’s shown on the surface. With every case, there’s the hidden truths and secrets. As we go through these cases, we learn more about the characters. There’s no room for foolish humor as the anime maintains a suspenseful and thrilling atmosphere. To be quite honest, Sherlock Holmes and William Moriarty exposes everything about human personalities. Humans are among the most complex creatures on the planet and for this anime, it shows us why. With such a sensational premise, studio Production I.G. wanted to portray the show for its thrilling mood. Capturing such world based on a real life setting isn’t easy but truth to be told, it looks and feels just right. Indeed, Great Britain feels alive with the lavish architectures, aristocratic style clothing, and overall, corrupt culture. Watching this show gave me the impression that the animators and producers did extensive research. Character designs also lives and breathes the style of a crime mystery. In particular, William, Albert, and Louis stands out above crowds with their trademark hair and masking their true personalities. There’s also room for violence in the show as some crimes can be quite gruesome. Make no mistake, this anime may not be a gorefest but it isn’t a walk in the park either. Giving this show a chance will depend on if you feel like you’re the target audience. As a fan of crime fiction and mystery thrillers, I couldn’t be more excited when I heard about the anime adaptation news. This is also just the first half as the show will return in April 2021 for its second run. From what we’ve experienced from these 11 episodes, it’s safe to say that we will have at least one intriguing crime mystery thriller to talk about next year.

Time and time again Sherlock Holmes has been re-imagined, re-invented, modernised and so on. But often times, when set in the particular historical period the original novel is set, people forget the effects of the time period small intricacies. (as well as read and pay attention to the source material, but then again Sherlock name sells, seen by how much people venerate this anime lol) Moriarty is a incredibly interesting character in the novels, however he was not given a lot of focus. Here the anime had a chance to explore his character and...well choose to play the "Noble bad, poor good" card as his motivation.Which frankly for a character such as Moriarty is lacking(as in not strong enough for him to trouble himself). He's a genius like Sherlock, so he must have an even stronger motivation to push him to be the 'Napoleon of Crime'. Even if he did want to change the situation of the lower classes, crime is the least favourable thing, as often it hurts more those of which that do not have the means to defend themselves. The characters look great in the show, I do like their design but they lack strong motivators to follow Moriarty so blindly. The villains are often so dumb and easy to control that Moriarty is just a genius because he is surrounded by idiots. They butchered Sherlock's character too, I won't get into detail but it's worth seeing (he looks good but meh much too easily played by Moriarty). Fandom for this is often only simping for the looks of the show rather than the content, people aren't thinking too much about how some of the 'logic' is often very questionable. P.S. On Ep 8 - Police constables hats have Queen Elizabeth II's initials not Victoria's (and that's priceless aha) I've watched and found it a very ok show, definitely not the best of the best but good when there wasn't anything else too thrilling to watch.

It was a fun mystery/drama that managed to be rather light hearted despite its darker subject matter. Moriarty is a kind of Robin Hood character except instead of stealing from the rich and giving to the poor, he helps the poor murder the rich; often in ever more increasingly elaborate ways. It tries to tackle some interesting moral questions, but in my opinion doesn't delve very deep into them and thus is kind of shallow. "Rich people are terrible, the world would be better without them, so to bring about that better world let's kill them". Additionally, each "villain" is comically villainous to the point of seeming tolack any humanity or redeeming qualities, thus making it easy for the audience to sympathize with Moriarty's views without question. Holmes is the only one we really get to see grappling with the morality around killing someone, but even that isn't given much serious attention. Additionally I felt some of the more "anime-esque" additions kind of took away from the "real world" settings they were placed in. i.e. characters leaping onto and off of multi-story buildings, some of the hand to hand combat techniques, wearing cloaks whenever engaging in shady business, etc. Overall it was an enjoyable watch, nice to look at, rocking music for both the opening and ending, and had interesting enough stories to keep my attention, but it could have done more with its premise and wasn't spectacular, thought provoking, or particularly memorable.

Even when you think that there’s nothing worth it during a season, you find animes like Yuukoku no Moriarty to contradict you. Class differences. A concept that is old but that does not stop being an instaured matter nowadays; less harsher today, but still present. Despite this idea is a classic one, I really enjoy watching this controversial topic, and even more when is well managed. And what I like even more about Yuukoku no Moriarty is the way the main characters are not politically correct. They are not the perfect elite guys that sow justice and that fight for the poverty’s rights. No, they takejustice by hand in order to change the corrupt world. That premise isn’t that original either, is it? That doesn’t matter, because I think is well handled in this episodic anime that is quite catchy and that gives it a profound view. As I was saying, the topic that I mentioned, even if in the first episode is not displayed as such, is always there. The series starts with William Moriarty, the protagonist, living a rich life and behaving as some sort of Sherlock Holmes (I know, he’s his enemy, but that’s your first thought when you see this high class guy that, by reading a newspaper, can develop a serial killer’s case in the confort of this mansion). Conforming it advances, he investigates and, of course, effortless, he gets to a conclusion. And his only response to his resaults is to kidnap the guilty and to let the victim father’s take revenge. When I first watched this episode I thought it was going to be an anime with no depth nor development, just with the concept of this show being a serie of individual cases for each episode, but no, William becomes a crime counselor. and the next episodes give it the depth it deserved, decorating it with a pretty interesting background for the main cast, and a well managed detailed one, because it doesn’t just focus on William but also his two brothers’ ideals and surroundings; not perfect, but very very decent and gives the show other nuances. Some people can say this bg was longer than neccessary, but I personally loved that. The world has, in my opinion, an excellent construction, because it’s what they focus the most. I mean, it is not like every shounen where you need an almost entirely new world and its scopes to clarify, since it’s England, but the context is very well settled. The world is rotten and so are the rich people, yes, we know, but I felt it very crude and realistic. And also, relatable. Is according to the epoch it takes place. Currently, in real life, a lot of situations shown in the anime, of course, doesn’t happen like that, but the escence and the perspective of the class gap is clear and adequate adapted. Retaking what I said earlier, it doesn’t matter that this is an episodic anime, because everything is carefully connected and, as it advances, the cases of each episode go more cruel, violent and realistic, and you get it clear: the important thing is not the case itself, but its impact and how the main concept of the breach is being pulished episode by episode, sometimes in a subtle way, and sometimes it hits you in the face. The first case is a little bit exaggerated, consisting in a morbid man that chased after his servant’s children in order to torture them, just for fun, so my first impression was “this is just supposed to be a gore anime?”, but the air suddenly changed with the following cases, going from a woman who had his son dead because no doctor would attend him since they were poor, to a man who was separated from the woman he was in love because of social stratum. Yuukoku no Moriarty demonstrates then that can handle a very dark atmosphere and a tragic sad one at the same time. William Moriarty is actually likeable. Math teacher by day and a criminal by night, he is a leader by nature, charismatic and humble. Is a smartass with an IQ of 3000, the typical main character that never looses an argument or a lead. However, what I really appreciate of him is how determined he is and how his ideals take a lot of place since the beginning, showing a man with a debatable moral that, without a Death Note, is resolute to construct a new world with no evil rich, giving the least benefited people the opportunity to accompany him with a steady hand, at the same time evaluating them and testing at what point are they going to go to achieve their vengeances or to actually change their situations. As I said earlier, this is not something new and I’m not saying he IS A HERO, I just state that, in my opinion, his ideology is clear and according to what he has shown. It’s like viewing the story from the villain’s point of view. That’s kinda interesting as well. Anyway, even though his brothers started as a strong presence by his side, as it progresses, they begin to be even more secondary than they already are, and when Sherlock Holmes makes his entrance, they just vanish like disposable characters. By the end of the show, I just saw them as William’s dogs and nothing more. On the other hand, we got the magnificent Sherlock Holmes. In my library I have a beautiful collection of Conan Doyle’s work, and I dare to say that I’m not a fan of Sherlock as a character himself, so when he first appeared I thought the show was going to decline, but it wasn’t the case. Even though I preferred the story told by Moriarty’s POV, the Sherlock that is shown in the anime is quite different from the literary one, since he’s more human and, in consequence, imperfect. I enjoyed that way of portraying him. Sherlock making mistakes, having moral messes, feeling defied by Moriarty, being a lazy, eccentric, frivolous man. That is good. Nevertheless, what’s even better about him is how they work on his rivalry with Moriarty, making every encounter between them something really bright and subtly tense. William likes to test him, and Sherlock respects him a lot, suspecting him since the first moment he witnessed a crime William masterminded. By the end of the anime, the real chess begins. Speaking of animation, I can’t say much. Is pretty decent and the character’s design is also good. It’s a Production Ig’s work, so I don’t have much to claim about it. It was visually pleasurable to me; although, some times there were moments when I though the facial expressions didn’t make justice to the thrilling scene. However, something I didn’t like was the sound. Personally, I thought the OST wasn’t suitable for the story. In another kind of series this could have been interesting (Thinking, idk, in Akudama Drive, for example), but in this one, I really felt out of place when an electro music appeared. I mean, I can’t see a carriage and then bang my head with that modern techno. Besides that, the voice actors did a decent job. Nothing I would recall, but it was fine. I had no faith on this since I didn’t like so much any of this season’s animes, but it turned out to be greater than what I was expecting. Not the best you’re gonna see, but certainly worth the shot. Personally, I am looking forward to seeing the second season.